BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2008

I am not obsessed with F1 personally. I think they have talent, and are probably very athletic. Looking at the top drivers they are all in very good shape. My problem with it is that the outcome is often resolved through technical issues such as engine failures or pit stops. That is not sport as far as I am concerned.

For me the sports personality of this year is Chris Hoy who won 3 golds, on top of the medals he won in Athens. He also won a number of golds at the world championships, I think including in events that he cannot compete in at the olympics as the event is not held then. I suspect that Rebecca (?) Adlington may take it. I think the BBC try to influence the outcome anyway through their trailers for the voting and the programme.

I'm not diminishing his achievements, and I realise how he dominated. However, I don't think sports personality should be from such a fringe sport, with a small pool of competitors and few spectators (at least in between the olympics anyway). Even in countries where cycling is very big (like Belgium and other European countries), it's only road cycling which is talked about.I don't agree with Clydey about formula 1. Who says a sport has to be all about sweating and pumping muscle? The skill and nerve of all formula 1 drivers is absolutely amazing.

I'm not diminishing his achievements, and I realise how he dominated. However, I don't think sports personality should be from such a fringe sport, with a small pool of competitors and few spectators (at least in between the olympics anyway). Even in countries where cycling is very big (like Belgium and other European countries), it's only road cycling which is talked about.I don't agree with Clydey about formula 1. Who says a sport has to be all about sweating and pumping muscle? The skill and nerve of all formula 1 drivers is absolutely amazing.

The skill of a formula 1 isn't the same league as that of a footballer or tennis player. At the end of the day they are driving. It is as much about the technology as it is the driver. You're kidding yourself if you say that formula 1 requires as much skill, training and endurance as a truly physical sport.

Formula 1 has a global field of 22 competitors, surely one of the smallest fields?

I'm a huge Hamilton fan, but a sizeable portion of F1 success is down to the teams and the mechanical reliability of the cars, and perhaps also pit stop strategy, would you not agree? No doubt that Hamilton is talented, he excelled at every level, karts, F3 and GP2 - but he's slipped up a few times this year when the pressure was on.

Hoy was flawless, he crushed the competition in every race he participated in.

Of course the actual formula 1 field is small, but the amount of people who race at lower levels is huge. I never meant that the actual race has to have a thousand people in it - no sport has that! Just the pool of competitors is too small in cycling.